Heartwarming footage from Hawaii has captured the moment a sailor returning from deployment managed to surprise his children by video calling them from outside their home. Spencer Christian, a naval service member, left for deployment in September of 2020 and arranged the surprise homecoming with the help of his wife Stacy.

While Spencer was away on deployment Stacy and their four children moved from South Carolina to Hawaii, which was a big transition. Though there was an element of uncertainty as to when Spencer would return home the children assumed he would be arriving sometime in July.

When it was confirmed that he would in fact be coming home in June, Stacy immediately knew that they would be putting together a surprise. On the day he came home, Stacy had a friend watch the kids while she went to pick him up. When they reached their home Spencer waited outside and proceeded to video call Stacy.

Their eldest daughter, Eleanor, realized quite quickly what was happening and ran outside to greet her dad. The other three children were a bit confused initially but eventually ran into their father’s arms as well.

Speaking about the video Stacy said: ‘My husband left for deployment in September of 2020 for 10 months. While gone, we had to move out of our rental home due to our landlord needing to sell it. So, I packed up my 4 kids (and dog) and moved from Charleston, South Carolina to Hawaii.

Our kids had the idea that he would be returning in July, so when it was confirmed he'd be coming in June I knew we should surprise them since they'd be unsuspecting. On the day he came home, I picked him up while my friends watched the kids at home.

Once we got home, he stayed outside of our house and FaceTimed me while I was in with the kids, with our house showing in the background. My oldest daughter realized what was happening, but my other three kids (triplets) were still confused. They were even more confused when they heard Eleanor (big sister) crying. There was a little bit of shock on their part, but once they realized it was him, they couldn't wait to be in his arms.’